Journalism and Documentary Day (Nov. 16)

Kathleen Lingo is an Oscar-nominated producer and the first editorial director of film and television for The New York Times. She is focused on developing and producing nonfiction feature films and television series. In 2020, three feature documentaries she produced for The New York Times premiered: Time (Amazon Studios), nominated for a 2021 Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature; Some Kind of Heaven (Magnolia Pictures), which premiered at the 2020 Sundance Film Festival and earned over $1 million at the box office in 2021; and Father Soldier Son (Netflix), recognized for Best Editing at Tribeca Film Festival and with two Emmy nominationsl. Before becoming editorial director, she was executive producer of The Times’ short documentary series Op-Docs. During her tenure, the series published 250 shorts, virtual reality and interactive documentaries that garnered accolades including three Oscar nominations, ten Emmy nominations, three Emmy Awards, two Peabody Awards, and two IDA Awards for Best Short Form series.

Rebecca Teitel is the VP of Documentary for TIME Studios where she oversees the development and production of premium feature documentaries and non-scripted television. Rebecca works closely with filmmakers, TIME reporters and co-production partners to develop and pitch projects, secures financing and distribution, and provides creative and strategic support throughout production. In addition to her role as creative executive on TIME’s non-fiction slate, she helps oversee the Studio’s finance fund, reviews external pitches for potential partnership and investment, and identifies and recruits talent and emerging filmmakers. Prior to joining TIME Studios, Rebecca worked as a director, producer and journalist. Her work has been featured on National Geographic, the Sundance Channel, Discovery, NBC, the History Channel, BET, and The New York Times, among others.

Since launching NBC News Studios in 2020 Liz has developed and supervised a wide array of premium documentaries and series, including, most recently, Memory Box: Echoes of 9/11, which was featured at the Toronto Film Festival. In more than two decades as a journalist and storyteller, she has produced everything from breaking news to longform investigations to true crime. Liz is also the executive producer of Dateline, the longest running show in NBC primetime history and an executive producer of Studios’ first scripted project, The Thing About Pam, starring Renee Zellweger. Liz is the winner of multiple Emmy, DuPont and Peabody awards.

Emily is currently the Vice President of video and TV for Vox.com, where serves as an executive producer on longform TV and streaming projects, as well as overseeing digital video enterprises. Prior to joining Vox she led the news team on the Peabody and Emmy winning Netflix series Patriot Act. At HBO’s Vice News Tonight her work on immigration and the Trump administration’s abortion policies contributed to Gracie, Front Page, and Emmy award wins. She oversaw live video coverage of the 2016 election at The New York Times, and set up the first New York based video team for BuzzFeed. She’s also produced documentary shows for CNN and MTV, and got her start in news at the NYC staple: NY1.

Award-winning journalist Yvette M. Miley serves as SVP of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion for the NBCU News Group. Her responsibilities include recruiting, training and development, employee engagement, and editorial initiatives across all four networks. Miley is also Executive-in-Charge of the NBC News digital platform NBCOUT, the first LGBTQ news vertical created by a major broadcast media organization.

Dawn Porter is an American documentary filmmaker and the founder of the production company Trilogy Films. Her award-winning films include Gideon’s Army (2013), about three black public defenders working in the southern United States, Spies of Mississippi (2014), about the Mississippi State Sovereignty Commission (MSSC) efforts to preserve segregation during the 50s and 60s, Trapped, about the impact of anti-abortion laws on abortion providers in the South, and Bobby Kennedy for President, which debuted on Netflix.   As a two-time Sundance film festival director, Porter’s work has been featured on HBO, Netflix, CNN, PBS, MSNBC, MTV Films, and other platforms. Porter’s latest documentary, The Lady Bird Diaries, an all-archival documentary about Lady Bird Johnson debuted at the 2023 SXSW Film Festival where it won the Lone Star Prize. Her next project entitled Deadlocked:  How America Shaped the Supreme Court, a four-part docuseries, explores the history of the Supreme Court, the justices, decisions, and confirmation battles that have shaped the United States. The series will premiere on Paramount/Showtime on September 22nd.  Other current projects include directing the MGM documentary Cirque Du Soleil: Without a Net which was a centerpiece at the 2022 DOC NYC Festival and directing/executive producing a 6-part series on the continuation of the historic civil rights documentary series Eyes on the Prize for HBO. Additional credits include The Me You Can’t See (Apple TV+), Rise Again: Tulsa and the Red Summer (National Geographic), The Way I See It (Focus Features), John Lewis: Good Trouble (CNN, Magnolia Pictures), 37 Words (ESPN), Un(re)solved (Frontline PBS), and Gideon’s Army (HBO).

DAVID FRANCE is an Oscar-nominated filmmaker, New York Times bestselling author, and award-winning investigative journalist. His latest book, titled HOW TO SURVIVE A PLAGUE (Knopf, 2016), received the Baillie Gifford Prize for best nonfiction book published in the English Language and the Green Carnation Prize, among many others. His directorial debut, HOW TO SURVIVE A PLAGUE (IFC Films 2012), was nominated for an Oscar, two Emmys, and a Directors Guild Award. The documentary won the Peabody Award and top honors from Gotham Awards, the International Documentary Association and the New York Film Critics Circle. His 2017 film, THE DEATH & LIFE OF MARSHA P. JOHNSON (Netflix), won numerous festival prizes and was awarded the Outfest “Freedom Award” and a special jury recognition from Sheffield International Documentary Festival. Critics put it on multiple “Best of the Year” lists. David’s newest documentary, WELCOME TO CHECHNYA (HBO Max 2020), won the special jury award for documentary editing at the 2020 Sundance Film Festival, and it received the Panorama Audience Award and Amnesty International Film Prize at 2020 Berlinale. The film was further recognized with a Peabody Award, a BAFTA Award and a Primetime Emmy nomination. He’s currently in production on a documentary taking an inside look at the global race to research, develop, regulate, and roll out COVID-19 vaccines in the war against the pandemic with a targeted domestic and international release in 2022.

Diane Tsai is a Taiwanese-American documentary filmmaker and journalist at TIME. Her award-winning documentary series FIRSTS, which she directed and produced with Spencer Bakalar, features 46 groundbreaking women from Hillary Clinton to Serena Williams. The series received POYi Documentary Project of the Year, a Webby Award nomination, SPD Gold Medal, official selection of the U.S. State Department’s American Film Showcase, among others. In 2018, she was part of a team named Livingston Award finalists for THE SILENCE BREAKERS, a short documentary on the women whose voices sparked the #MeToo movement. BE OUR GUEST is her first feature film.

Jacob Soboroff is a correspondent for NBC News and MSNBC and the author of the New York Times bestseller Separated: Inside an American Tragedy. For his reporting on the Trump administration’s child separation policy, he received the 2019 Walter Cronkite Award for Individual Achievement by a National Journalist and the 2019 Hillman Prize for Broadcast Journalism. He lives in Los Angeles with his wife Nicole Cari and their two children.

Julie is an Academy Award nominated documentary director whose films include RBG, JULIA & My Name is Pauli Murray (all directed with Betsy West), as well as The Sturgeon Queens, American Veteran and more. Before she started making docs, Julie was a staff producer for Dateline NBC and the creator and producer of Supreme Court Watch on Court TV.

Sonia Kennebeck is an independent filmmaker with 18 years of directing and producing experience. Her most recent feature documentary United States vs. Reality Winner premiered at SXSW 2021, and her documentary thriller Enemies of the State was selected for TIFF 2020. Kennebeck’s first feature-length film National Bird premiered at Berlinale 2016, received the Ridenhour Documentary Film Prize and a 2018 Emmy-nomination for Outstanding Current Affairs Documentary. Foreign Policy magazine recognized Kennebeck as one of 100 Leading Global Thinkers, she was selected as one of 25 New Faces of Independent Film by Filmmaker Magazine, and DOC NYC included her in the 40 Under 40 list of documentary filmmakers. She is the 2021 recipient of the Adrienne Shelly Excellence in Filmmaking Award. Sonia Kennebeck is a first-generation college graduate who worked full-time while completing her master’s degree in international affairs at American University in Washington, D.C. She was born in Malacca, Malaysia.

Ali Moss is an Emmy Award-nominated documentary producer. In 2012, she co-founded The Public Good Projects, whose mission is to leverage the power of the media to make complex problems easier to understand. She EP’d Sleepless in America (National Geographic); served as an executive at Discovery, where she co-produced Rancher, Farmer, Fisherman; produced the Emmy-nominated documentary Not Done: Women Remaking America (PBS) and produced Yusuf Hawkins: Storm Over Brooklyn (HBO/Tribeca). Most recently, she produced Fauci (Telluride 2021/Disney+.)

Nanfu Wang is an award-winning Chinese filmmaker based in the U.S. She is a recipient of the 2020 MacArthur Genius Grant. Her feature documentaries include Hooligan Sparrow (Sundance 2016), I Am Another You (SXSW 2017, Special Jury Prize winner), One Child Nation (Sundance 2019, Grand Jury Prize Winner), and In the Same Breath (Sundance 2021). In her films, Wang creates intimate character studies that examine the impact of authoritarian governance, corruption, and lack of accountability on the lives of individuals and the well-being of communities. With the rigor of an investigative journalist and immersive, emotionally powerful storytelling, Wang interrogates notions of responsibility, freedom, and truth.

Matthew Heineman is an Academy Award®-nominated and Emmy Award-winning filmmaker. The Sundance Film Festival called Heineman “one of the most talented and exciting documentary filmmakers working today”, while Anne Thompson of Indiewire wrote that Heineman is a “respected and gifted filmmaker who combines gonzo fearlessness with empathetic sensitivity.”

He most recently directed, produced, shot and edited The First Wave, a feature documentary film with exclusive access inside one of New York City’s hardest-hit hospital systems during the harrowing first four months of the COVID-19 pandemic. The First Wave received the International Documentary Association’s prestigious Pare Lorentz Award, was shortlisted for an Academy Award®, and was nominated for seven Emmy® awards, winning Best Documentary, Best Cinematography, and Best Editing.